2014 is Here

What a busy stretch it has been since I last had the time to write an entry here.  This weekend, the William and Mary Tidewater Classic is happening, and I am going!  With that, I thought I'd jot down some things that have been on my mind since last August.

The first thing a lot of you will notice if you find me at the races is that I'm shaving my head.  Not razor to scalp, but close enough.  For the past few years, I've been losing my hair, and I went through your typical 20-something obsessing over their image phase for a while.  I did Monoxidil, Nizoral shampoo, and even Emu Oil (which is actually awesome for the skin).  My takeaways are that Monox gave me the little documented 'aging' look in the face, and didn't help at all with hair loss on the front.  I never even considered Finasteride...too much risk of permanently changing your body chemistry with that.  Nope, after a few years of seeing it happen in the mirror, I finally too the guard off the clippers and chopped all the hair off, and I couldn't be more relieved.

All that anxiety because my hair was falling out and I was freaking.  I should have just accepted that I was going to lose my hair and shaved it and dealt with it once it really started.  When Monoxidil was kind of keeping it in check, I didn't look at my hair and say 'yeah, awesome'.  Some people care a lot about their image and go a lot further to preserve or regain their hair, and that is great if that is what they want to look like.  Me, I don't really care about what people think of my appearance, and it was only some phantom insecurity I developed because I thought I wasn't going to look young anymore.  End of 20's going on 30's isn't exactly young...my parents had me when they were 21/22!

There is a lot more I could write about the topic, but the moral of the story for me is that I came away with some personal growth and a little bit of 'recalibration' at how I need to hold myself in society.  I still feel like I'm the same person as when I was 13, but I'm certainly not, and I need to remind myself of this every once in a while.

Anyways, if you are reading this and are in a similar position, just know that no one else really gives a shit about your hair except for you.  Go see a hair replacement clinic if that is what will make you happy, but don't make the mistake in worrying about how others perceive you.

On a different note, I've been making a concerted effort to stay more in touch with family.  I had a slightly alternative upbringing, with seasonal stepsisters, custody agreements, and an entire family on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.  I was never able to spend as much time with everyone as I wanted to, and I fell into a sort habit of solitude.

This is a little bit ironic for me, but a product helped me out; I got a MotoX smartphone a few months ago, upgrading from a hand-me-down HTC Incredible (1).  My new phone runs all the apps and has a front facing camera.  I can easily hit up all my family members on all the different channels they hang out on.  Facebook, Google+, Txt, Instagram, Skype, Snapchat, etc.  This has been so awesome that I even went and got an iPod so I could facetime with people who use that as their primary channel.  I'm really late to the 'stay-in-touch' party, but I'm trying to make up for lost time...

Peace from the Salt Ponds